


Riches

by andchaos



Category: Black Sails
Genre: Canon Compliant, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Explicit Language, Explicit Sexual Content, F/F, Feelings, Mid-Canon, Porn with Feelings, Season/Series 03, just a little because i actually added in some, some fucking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-13
Updated: 2017-07-13
Packaged: 2018-12-01 17:59:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,055
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11491671
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/andchaos/pseuds/andchaos
Summary: “Soon, our futures will be secure,” says Max, taking a step closer to Anne.High up in the fort, they don’t have to worry about anyone seeing them. Anne’s eyes dart away from her still, first toward the closed gate and then over the piles of gold and the overflowing chests all around their feet.“What will you do with all of your riches?”Anne touches her fingers to Max’s waist.“I have some idea,” she says.Sex on piles of gold? Well…yeah. It’s the true pirate experience.





	Riches

**Author's Note:**

> mentions of anne's first husband being not a nice dude™  
> this was supposed to be just pwp but it's not because i can't fucking help myself talking about their feelings
> 
> xox

“What are we doing, going up there?”

Anne’s grunt floats back to Max, who merely tosses a glance over her shoulder before turning back forward. Her eyes latch on to their destination, the crest of which rises well above the rest of the rooftops scattered along the sand. That fort, looming over them—Max is sure they are both imagining the heaps of treasure that they know lie behind those walls. So she continues walking; she knows Anne will be following.

“Is it a crime?” Max asks. “To want to see what will, someday soon, make us the most fortunate women in Nassau?”

Anne doesn’t say anything for a long moment.

“Fortune ain’t got a thing to do with it,” she says at last. Lower, under her breath, she adds, “I still say you’re up to something.”

“Ah, hush,” chastises Max, but even she can hear the affection heaped on beneath the tease. “You’ve been grumbling for days now. Can’t I do something to make my…to make you feel better?”

Max’s unsaid words hang between them, a palpable stumbling block in the air. Max lifts her chin and refuses to let it trip her.

A few days ago, Max told Anne that their paths would one day diverge. That the world would inevitably rend them apart, no matter their feelings, and that they would have to forget the cozy, warm, _safe_ life that they had crafted from scratch with their bare hands, inside the hard walls of Max’s bedroom. Max is unsure what’s been bothering Anne more, the idea that they will have to part, or the contrast of Anne’s own steadfast refusal to fathom that moment with Max’s soft acceptance of their fate. She’s sure, to Anne’s ears, her words must have sounded like she is comfortable saying goodbye.

And she isn’t. She doesn’t want Anne to confuse her realism with the idea that she won’t be just as aching and empty and heartbroken when that day does come.

She reaches back, and after a moment’s hesitation, feels Anne’s fingers slip through hers. Max squeezes tight and doesn’t let her go.

“Let me show you why I feel as I do,” says Max.

“Because you’re a right sea-witch when it comes to trying to make me happy,” says Anne gruffly. Max laughs, and Anne’s pace quickens until they are walking side by side.

Up on top of the hill, Anne makes it to the latches that undo the gate first, but Max holds the gates for Anne to pass through ahead of her. Anne tilts her head in acknowledgement as she passes by, and Max almost laughs at how much it looks like she’s tipping her hat.

They both pause for a moment when the gates click closed behind them, taking in the view.

The treasure isn’t tucked safely away in chests anymore, as it was when they first stashed it away. Gold lies in heaps and cascades over the chests’ sides, all over the fort floor. Locks broke here and there as the days passed since they first made the stockpile, or people meticulously counted the treasure and didn’t bother packing it all away properly again. Whatever the reason, it’s a veritable mess now, but Max for once can’t be bothered with security as her eyes hungrily drink in the sight of all these riches. Hers, and Anne’s, and Jack’s. None of them will have anyone else to answer to soon. Soon she can be, and do, and have whatever she likes.

Max’s eyes resettle on Anne.

“Soon, our futures will be secure,” says Max, taking a step closer to the other woman.

High up in the fort, they don’t have to worry about anyone seeing them. Anne’s eyes dart away from her still, first toward the closed gate and then over the piles of gold and the overflowing chests all around their feet. Max has to admit, all these riches heaped over each other, it’s almost as breathtaking a sight as Anne is, especially when Anne strides forward toward the center of it all and takes it in, pride and lust clear on her sharp face; but Max trains her gaze, and crosses the distance between them. When she brushes the back of her fingers over Anne’s cheek, Anne startles and turns like she hasn’t noticed Max come nearer. Max steps close, until their lips are only a breath away.

“What will you do with all of your riches?”

Anne touches her fingers to Max’s waist.

“I have some idea,” she says. Her voice is low, but Max can still hear the slight tremor in it.

“Tell me,” Max insists.

She draws back, letting her hands slide down Anne’s arms until their palms are clasped. When Max steps back, Anne comes with her, drawn inexorably by the promise of her kiss. Max doesn’t let her heated gaze soften for even a second as she backs up until her heels hit some of the coins strewn about and, without breaking stride, she makes an almost graceful show of dropping back against the pile of gold beneath her, letting go of Anne’s hands before she falls.

Max smiles, glancing to where her fingers stroke the coins beneath them before turning her gaze back up at Anne.

Anne gives a playful little growl and makes a much less coordinated tumble down, but Max gasps when Anne captures her in a kiss, and it’s just as likely to make heat pool between her legs as if Anne had all the elegance of one of the brothel girls. Even more, probably. Her Anne—her dangerous, catlike, vicious Anne—is a much more preferable prize than any of them.

“This can’t be any more comfortable for you than it is me,” says Anne when she finally comes up for air, arching her back so she can shake her wildly frizzing hair from her face.

Max grins and steals Anne’s hat from off her head with quick fingers, settling it over the crown of her own.

“But how can I pass up having my two favorite things all over me?” says Max. For emphasis, she takes a handful of coins from beside herself and tosses them up so they rain down over the both of them.

Anne gives a startled laugh and ducks, tossing one arm up over her head to shield them both. Anne gives a mock glare and plucks the hat back off Max’s head, tossing it to the side. Max takes the opportunity of Anne’s renewed closeness to press her palms to either side of Anne’s face and pull her down for another kiss, this one more playful than the last.

Regardless, though, every kiss with Anne is at least a little heated, and it isn’t a surprise when a minute later Anne’s hand is roaming down Max’s side. She palms briefly at Max’s breast, one thumb slipping over her nipple hard enough for Max to feel it through the fabrics of her dress, and Max gasps. She tilts her chin up and Anne leans further into her, pressing her harder down, licking only teasingly at Max’s upper lip for a second before darting back in and kissing her in earnest. Despite her past employment, or maybe because of it, Max is still easy to rile up, and unashamed when she is. She moans, loud and long, and Anne palms at her in more earnest at the sound.

Max slides her arms around the woman on top of her, pressing her palms into Anne’s back. A broken kind of noise falls out of Anne’s mouth, and she presses her hips down hard into Max’s. Max likes that about her, the roughness; she doesn’t mind that half the time, the places where their bones meet end up bruised. Anne is thrusting her hips down into Max’s like she’s a wild thing, magnetized to Max with need. Max’s lips curl in an instinctive smile when she reaches to tug Anne’s shirt from her breeches, slipping her fingers over the warm skin there. Anne shivers on top of her, and Max’s fingertips creep up Anne’s bare sides before raking down her ribs in one quick movement.

Anne presses her full weight down, her kissing slowing down, her breath coming in great, slow gulps. Max curls one hand into Anne’s hair, keeping her anchored while Max leans up to run her tongue along the roof of Anne’s mouth, and then shifts her to press her mouth to Anne’s neck.

Anne only allows this handling for a moment before she seems to regain control of her shaking limbs, and she presses the hand not holding herself up over Max along the neckline of Max’s dress, like she’s toying with the idea of playing with her tits again. Max’s other hand, wandering near the waistline of Anne’s breeches, stutters.

It takes Max a long few minutes of this to clear her head, to remember that she had something she wanted to say. The thought floats to the forefront of her mind in slow, grasping waves, barely touching the shore with every pass until finally it pushes through. Max grasps Anne’s shoulders and, with great difficulty, pushes her back.

“What?” demands Anne at once. She looks like she’s just got off a ship after a long sail. She brushes some of Max’s curls away from her eyes. “What is it?”

She sounds more annoyed than anything else.

“I just want you to know,” Max says, but a lot of her firmness is cut through by her ragged breathing and she takes a couple of deep breaths to get her own head back in order. She shakes it, jumbles it really, trying to make the pieces of sanity fit back together when they so want to jump over the edge of the fort and into the ocean whenever Anne is on top of her. It doesn’t help that one of her breasts is half-exposed, sending shivers down her chest whenever the sea breeze hits her.

“Want me to know what?” says Anne, with a little less malice this time.

She sits up, relieving her arm of all her weight. Max follows after, curling her knees to her chest as she pierces Anne with her gaze. It’s easier to focus like that. Still, they’re close together and she’s sitting in the spread of Anne’s legs where she’s got her knees propped up on either side of Max’s hips.

“I know how you felt—how you still feel about me putting words to what we are,” Max begins.

Anne’s eyes are already away, flicking between the floor and the bright blue sky—anywhere but on Max’s face, like she wasn’t just prepared to get off on Max’s thigh a mere moment ago. She closes off so easily.

“D’you know,” Anne says after a moment, “that I was married once? A long, long time ago.”

“I know.”

“He was a devil, you know.” Her voice is flat, matter-of-fact. Even when she looks at Max, her eyes skip over Max’s, flickering to the edges of her face and away like she can’t completely ignore the draw, but wants to.

The urge to reach out seizes Max, to stroke her cheek, her arm, _something_ —but she knows it isn’t the time. She lets her hand drop down to Anne’s foot near her thigh, and she doesn’t do anything but let it rest there, but she feels like she can see something in the side of Anne’s clenched jaw soften.

“I wish that was the worst of it. The temper I could manage. But he just wanted me to be some perfect wife, some model of a woman.” She snorts. “He ain’t never met a real woman before. Just seen the girls at the brothels bat their eyes at him, I’d reckon.”

“He must have known from the beginning that wasn’t you.”

“Yeah, but he figured he could—I don’t know, tame me. I guess he almost did, at one point. But I was never really me, not one second after he and I met and he made me stand at the alter with him. I was young.

“It was odd, when I think about it. He used to be so sweet. Then one day he caught wind of a rumor that I’d stabbed this servant girl with a kitchen knife just because some other cunt had got my blood hot. It wasn’t the same after that.”         

Max waits for her to continue, but Anne just sits there with her elbows draped on her knees and her hair blowing across her face as she looks off in the direction of the ocean, almost like she can see it through the walls of the fort. Max says nothing, just sits there and starts rubbing slow circles on the side of Anne’s foot with her thumb, through her boot, and waits for Anne to continue.

“And Jack reckons we’re good as married now, too,” she says at last.

That sets something flickering to life inside of her.

“You can’t—Anne,” and she sounds like a slow-burning fire. “Fuck Jack! And fuck the rest of the world! You think I, of all people, wish to own you? I do not!”

Anne raises her eyes, startled. “I don’t—”

“This is not about making you into some puppet of mine! Or me one of yours!”

“Oh yeah?” says Anne, just as fiercely. “What is it about then? Fucking hell, Max. I don’t know what you want with me half the time.”

“I do not expect forever,” says Max levelly. “I would be a fool to think I could hold onto something so precious as this. But I want it while I have it, yes! And I think that we both deserve to be happy, while we can! Before the world rips it away, I want that with you! Haven’t we both earned as little as that?”

Anne raises her eyes to Max’s.

“Time with you ain’t little,” she says, eyes hard, voice soft; the complete opposite of Max right now.

“I don’t want to be a wife any more than you do,” says Max, “but while we can, just for awhile—yes. I would like to be yours.”

Their eyes hold for a long, suspended moment. Anne’s mouth has dropped open, just a little bit, and her eyes keep flicking down to Max’s. Max sets her jaw and holds her breath and waits.

Then, like a wave has come over her, Anne grabs Max’s chin in one hand, gives her one second to ready herself, and they crash into each other like—well, like only pirates and their consorts can.

Anne tastes like the sea salt in her hair and on her cheeks, like half-stale mead and tobacco she must have gotten her hands on recently. Max pulls her in closer, wanting to taste more of it, not because of any particular affinity for those things but because they are all tied up in the inextricable taste of Anne Bonny and that makes them almost addictive, not quite sweet but with a pull all the same. Max has her own wants, her own ambitions, but sometimes when she’s with Anne she can see exactly why Anne acts like the future isn’t real. Why she can’t fathom them leaving each other, even though they’re both much smarter than that.

Anne clutches her back like she’s thinking something mighty similar.

After a moment, Anne pushes Max back down onto the coins and keeps kissing her with an urgency that feels almost like the kind they had shared a few days ago, when Max talked about parting, except now it is so much _better_. Anne feels solid on top of her, not like time is already melting her away. And she’s scrabbling her fingers at Max’s sides in the most delicious way, like she can’t get enough of her, like she would fight the whole fucking world if it tried to rip her away.

Max pushes back just as intensely, curling her fingers so hard in Anne’s hair for a moment that she knows it probably hurts. She has to consciously relinquish her death-grip, and she pats down Anne’s hair to soothe the ache best she can. Anne isn’t being nearly so careful, tearing at the strings that hold together Max’s dress like they’re personally offending her, and Max laughs as she bats Anne’s hands away and undoes the knots in a few quick motions, stripping off her brassiere as well. Her sleeves pool around her shoulders, and she lifts her arms away. Anne presses the dress down to Max’s waist with a swift tug and then spreads her hands out over Max’s now-bare sides, just on the underside of Max’s breasts.

“You know what I’m gonna do with my share?” asks Anne in between open-mouthed kisses to her collarbone and across her chest, ducking her head to get closer and closer to where Max knows she wants to be.

Max sighs contentedly, spreading her arms out above her head. Anne growls when it bares her even more, pushing her breasts out towards Anne’s face.

“What?” says Max. “I did ask, after all.”

“I’m gonna spoil you rotten,” says Anne, and Max can feel her teeth baring in a grin against her skin. “You’ve spent months trying to do that much for me. I’m gonna return the favor.”

“Not if I spoil you first,” Max teases, but her quiet laughter ends on a long moan when Anne wraps her lips around Max’s left nipple in retribution and she sucks hard, flicking her tongue out to tease the nub too.

“Oh yeah?” says Anne after a moment, pressing a smacking kiss to the spot right between Max’s breasts before leaning to mouth at the other one, too. “Ain’t nothing you can buy me here that’ll match what I can bring back when I sail.”

“I’ll buy us a house,” says Max. “Here, on the island. Somewhere away from all the crowds and trouble.”

Anne keeps licking and biting at her breasts whenever she isn’t looking up to talk, and it’s making it mighty hard to keep track of their conversation. Max winds one of her legs around Anne’s waist and slips the other between her legs, pressing up until she’s rubbing against Anne’s thigh. Anne growls softly and slips her hands down over Max’s hips, holding her down. She tracks wet kisses up toward Max’s throat, sucking hard at where Max’s pulse is beating wildly against her skin.

Anne leans up so her lips are at Max’s ear.

“I’m gonna win us a castle,” she rasps. “I’ll murder a whole fucking king’s guard to win us one. Can you imagine? All that land, all those riches and jewels and king’s men. At our command.”

“You’d hate being so far inland,” says Max, before pulling Anne in for a bruising kiss.

“We can vacation there,” Anne says when they part, shrugging one shoulder as she sits up on her haunches, both her legs tucked between Max’s spread ones. Like it’s nothing at all to her, she rakes up Max’s skirts with one hand and presses her hand up, up, _up_ —

“Oh, _Anne_ ,” Max breathes.

Her breath is coming in short, shallow pants now. Every now and again she swallows hard to try and collect her thoughts, but as though Anne can read the shift on her face, she just creeps her hand further and further up Max’s thighs every time she almost manages to focus. Anne’s eyes are trained raptly on her, and it’s making Max flush hot all over.

Anne scratches her nails against the sensitive skin just below the apex of Max’s thighs, and it makes her whole body arch off the pile she’s on. Anne grins wickedly.

“You won’t turn into a princess when you’re wanting for nothing, will you?” asks Anne.

In one motion, Max sits up and wraps her fingers around the back of Anne’s neck, kissing her hard. At the same time, she brings her other hand between her own legs and presses Anne’s palm flush against her. She can feel her own pulse throbbing hot against Anne’s hand, and Anne gives a wretched moan.

“God, Max,” Anne mumbles, muffled and awed, “you’re so—”

Max bites down on Anne’s bottom lip, soothes it with her tongue, licks hungrily into Anne’s mouth. She presses her mouth to Anne’s neck when she needs to breathe, kissing her there artlessly.

“Say it,” Max whispers. Stumbling fingers tear open Anne’s bodice, and Anne’s breathing picks up when Max palms at her tits with one hand and slips the other down the back of Anne’s trousers, squeezing low on Anne’s backside because it always make Anne shake when she’s that close to her cunt.

“You’re so _wet_ ,” whispers Anne, and Max laughs breathlessly, only to break off in a high-pitched keen when Anne pushes aside the soft cotton against her hand and presses two fingers inside her.

“I won’t be a princess,” says Max, shaking her hair back behind her head and picking up on their conversation like she hadn’t just dropped it. Anne pumps her fingers slowly, just barely off-rhythm, but still good enough to make Max want to wrap her thighs around Anne’s waist. Anne leans her forehead against Max’s temple.

“Oh yeah?” says Anne, grinning close to Max’s cheek.

“We’ll both be _queens_ ,” says Max.

Anne curls her fingers inside Max, rubbing up against the spot inside her that makes her see cannons firing, but only stays there for a moment before she goes back to her steady pumping of her hand. Max presses her hand against Anne’s again, and Anne, knowing too well what she wants by now, slides a third finger in with the others the next time she pushes inside her. The heel of her hand rubs up against Max’s clit on every other pass, with just the right amount of friction to make her lift her hips but not so much that she’s sensitive. Max lets out something like a whine, brushing her lips blindly against Anne’s cheek before she goes back to just panting. It’s impossible to really move her hips from her position, but she still tries.

“Queens,” Anne muses. She’s trying obviously to sound blasé, but Max can hear how wildly undone she is, and can see and smell and taste the sweat started to drip down the sides of Anne’s face from under her hair, can feel her heated skin where Max is pressing her hands up Anne’s back, touching her ribs, rubbing her bare breasts. “Not sure how good a queen I’d make. But you can’t top that, huh? Can you?”

Max mirrors back the smirk Anne has turned her way, wrapping her hands around Anne’s upper arms as if to steady herself. Anne’s so bared now that she shivers in the sudden cold air when Max pulls away, and Max kisses her briefly in apology, just a brush of their mouths, before she pushes back on Anne’s shoulders. The confusion flickering in Anne’s eyes as she slides her hand out of Max’s shift only lasts for a split second before she seems to cotton on to the fire in Max’s eyes, and Max watches her tongue dart out to wet her lips before she presses her back.

“I can think,” says Max, her dress sliding down toward her thighs when she rises onto her knees, pushing Anne’s shirt off her shoulders and exposing her fully to the open air, “of one thing that might swing things in my favor.”

Anne’s eyes darken; there’s nowhere else to go except up a little to sit on one of the chests next to where they’ve been kissing, and even that still hangs partially open even with all of Anne’s weight on top of it. Max tugs down Anne’s breeches, only for her eye to catch on something and she pauses. She reaches into the small space where the chest is still open, feeling Anne’s eyes on the back of her neck, and extracts two pieces.

“Are you really digging for treasure right now?” Anne demands.

Max sits back on her heels. For a moment, Anne glows above her. Max lifts her hands so the jewelry shines too in the late sunlight.

There’s a pause, a lull, of total silence as Max reaches for Anne’s hand and slowly slides the chunky bit of gold and violet-tinged kunzite onto Anne’s index finger. Anne blinks down at the piece for a moment before turning her palm up, and she puts a gold and emerald ring on Max’s pointer as well. They stare together at the small jewels, flashing in the afternoon sun.

“Aw hell, Max,” says Anne at last, and Max wants to laugh. Anne rarely says her name flat out, but even when she has before, it’s never dripped off Anne’s tongue so sweet.

Max knows just what she means, though. It’s nothing more than a gesture, really, a part of their riches that will be divided up between them regardless when the time comes. Still, Max knows exactly what she meant by it. It’s not really a declaration that they belong to each other, not in the way that Anne fears, but it’s still—a gesture. One that they both understand.

Usually when she pretends like they’ve been, that they can stay together after it all ends—it usually hurts, it usually _aches_. It’s why Max so rarely indulges such fantasies. But sitting here, way up away from the bustle of town, sitting amongst all their riches, hearing Anne say her name like that—it makes her heart swell, and she feels lighter than she can remember feeling in a good long while.

“Anne,” says Max, breathlessly.

Anne is still sitting up, balanced on the edge of her perch. Max sucks in air sharply, and then she puts her hands on either one of Anne’s knees and spreads them wide. They get stuck on the trousers pooled around her ankles, and only when they hit that point does Max dive in. She presses wild, blind kisses to the insides of Anne’s knees, and then wetter ones as she trails an uneven, desperate path up Anne’s thighs, sometimes pulling back to blow cool air across the patches she just kissed so that Anne shakes. Anne’s breathing is already short, and she has one of her hands in Max’s hair, bunching it up at the top. When Max briefly glances up, she sees Anne’s head thrown back, her eyes closed. Her lips are faintly trembling, and she could be whispering a prayer, or murmuring praises under her breath, Max doesn’t know.

And she doesn’t care. All she does care for is the knowledge that Anne looks absolutely breathtaking, all loose and carefree and wild as she is right now, and Max gets to have her. At least for now.

She braces her hands against the chest beneath Anne’s backside for balance. She takes in a deep breath and then dives.

Anne’s dripping wet already, and she’s moaning as soon as Max starts dragging her tongue up between her folds. Anne isn’t loud, but she’s persistent and throaty, and her noises rarely let up once they start going. Max can already feel the wet running down her chin, and it flushes her hot between her legs—she still hasn’t come yet, but she doesn’t care. Anne has all of her attention.

She dips her tongue inside her, feeling Anne clench instinctively around her before settling again. Even here, she tastes a little bit like the sea, still mixed up with her own natural scent; Anne and the ocean are just inseparable, knotted so tightly together that there really can’t be one without the other. Anne reacting so desperately to her kisses, like she wants Max to join that troublesome twosome, just drives more of a fever through Max’s bones, and she presses her tongue inside her more urgently, dragging out more noises from Anne, again and again, each time she dips inside. She takes breaks from this to bite sharply and kiss softly at her thighs, to give her a reprieve from the onslaught of sensation inside her and also because it draws out these little _Ah_ s that are like siren calls to Max’s ears.

Anne’s panting so loud above her that Max can hear it, even when she’s not crying out. Max glances up, wants to see her chest heaving, but before she can catch more than a glimpse Anne has dragged her back between her legs. Max gets back to licking at her with a fervor; as much as she wants to see the beautiful picture that Anne makes coming undone, she adores when Anne loses herself to this. She was so careful and skittish when they started up, that seeing how far she’s come, how shameless, makes Max shiver.

After a few minutes she tilts her chin up to lick over her clit too, and hears the hitch in Anne’s breathing that comes when she does, so she does it again. Just to tease her, like Anne did to her before, Max goes back to lapping at her slit again, swirling her tongue around, letting Anne’s husky moans fill her ears.

Soon, Anne’s thighs are shaking around Max’s head. Max gets her hands wrapped around Anne’s thighs, pulls her down closer to her. Anne is the only thing tethering her now; the way she’s kneeling on her dress on the pile of gold isn’t doing anything to help her balance, and Anne is her only hold to equilibrium now.

The new position makes Anne throatier still, but some of her noises cut off for big, gulping breaths instead. Max releases one of her legs, but Anne still has it wrapped tightly around Max’s back so they don’t fall. With her freed hand, Max eases her fingers inside Anne, starting up a steady rhythm. Anne’s shaking in earnest now. Max’s chin is dripping, from spit and sweat and Anne; her hands are moist from the heat of the back of Anne’s thighs.

“Max, I’m— _Max_ —”

Max doesn’t need the warning, but Anne always gives her one anyway. It usually sounds more like a plea than anything.

Max wants her to feel high, shot up as far into the air as she can go. She curls her fingers just so inside of her, rubbing relentlessly against that magic spot that makes Anne’s noises completely choke off, and at the same time she lifts her chin to suck hard at Anne’s clit, flicking her tongue out against it for good measure.

Anne’s grip on Max’s hair grows almost cruel. Her back, almost her entire body lifts up into the air. She’s silent, and if Max could look up, she knows well the stretched-open mouth and the heaving chest that would be greeting her.

It takes a long while for Anne to come down from her orgasm, and Max licks her steadily, gently through it. When at last Anne seems relaxed—boneless, almost—Max lets go of her and falls back hard on her backside. She’s sure the coins digging into her hands will leave imprints on her palms. She wants to raise her face to the sky and laugh, because nothing could possibly matter less right now. As it is, she can’t stop grinning; everything about Anne always feels like a victory, a sweet one, for them both to share.

Still, though, there’s a persistent heat between her legs, and she’s growing slicker on her thighs as time passes. She lets Anne come down in peace though, lying flat out across the chest she’s collapsed on, both their breathing ragged and loud in the sudden silence. She doesn’t try to be inconspicuous as she rubs her thighs together.

At last, Anne pushes herself up. Max raises her eyes up to Anne’s face at the sound.

“C’mere,” Anne growls.

She crawls over Max on the pile of gold she’s on, and they kiss inexpertly as they fall back on it. They’re both still breathing too hard to do it properly, and smiling into each other’s mouths every time they try. They roll around on the pile, their legs getting tangled in Anne’s breeches and Max’s dress, still wrapped around them. They both get poked a lot by edges of coins, and they keep rolling around trying to lay out on top of the other so they can kiss the way each feels like kissing, and Anne’s laughing by the time she gets Max’s shoulders pinned down on bare floor and slides her hand down between her legs to finish her off.

Max is already so riled that she comes quickly, breathing Anne’s name reverently into her mouth as she rides Anne’s fingers to her finish. Anne kisses her softly as she comes down, all around her mouth and cheeks and the sides of her neck. Anne’s so warm and the sea air is so cool that Max’s body doesn’t know what temperature at which to level out as she comes down, recovering enough to wrap her arms around Anne’s middle and hold her close to her chest for a moment before splaying her arms out by her sides so Anne can roll off her and lay down too.

Max just wants to lay there forever and listen to her breathing even out, side by side with Anne’s. Right now, it sort of feels like they might have actually managed to make time stop, like they really do get to stay here with the sun on their faces and their limbs overlapping. Their chests rise and fall. Coins and jewels dig into their skin.

But the sand keeps falling, and the sea moves on the shore, and they are not out of the reach of time yet.

“You’ll have business to attend to, don’t you?” Anne asks. Her words are the first to break the long silence between them.

Max has lost track of the hour, but she knows she’s probably right. There are girls to manage, and deals that need approval, and battles to plan.

“Oui,” she sighs. “And Jack will be looking for you, won’t he?”

“Oui,” Anne says, the word mocking but her tone exasperated. Max rolls to press her smile into Anne’s hair, and then she kisses her forehead quickly and gets to her feet.

Anne sighs and follows Max up, pulling on Max’s hands for help. They’ve rolled quite a bit far from their clothes, and they trudge over the mess of treasure and jewels to retrieve them. They slip back into their dressings in companionable silence, the kind that comes from a lot of time growing to know one another until words can’t say nearly as much as silent looks do. Anne helps tie her back into her brassiere and dress. They inspect each other when they’re done to make sure neither of them look too conspicuous, and then they begin trudging toward the gates. Max can tell that Anne, like herself, is not looking forward to going back into the real world. There is only darkness there, and in the darkness, there be dragons.

As Anne’s unlatching the gate for the pair of them again, Max pauses, her eyes catching on her new ring glinting in the sun. She stares for a moment before casting an inquisitive look to the side at the other woman.

“What?” asks Anne, only sparing her a glance before focusing back on her hands’ work with the latch.

“What will you really do with your share of the treasure?” asks Max.

Anne gets the gate undone at last, and she waves Max through ahead of her. Max gives her a small smile as she passes, and then turns to start the way back toward town. Before she can get more than a few steps though, Anne’s hand alights on the small of her back, and Max feels her lean in close to speak in her ear.

“I guess you’ll just have to stick with me and find out,” Anne whispers, and throwing a mischievous smirk over her shoulder, she strolls ahead to take the lead.

Max almost stops, casting wide eyes at Anne’s back. After a second, she tucks her own, private smile into her chest and hurries to catch up.

**Author's Note:**

> [find me on tumblr here lol](http://lesbianfreyja.tumblr.com/post/162946061165)


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